


live as many times as you got to, but you only gotta die once

by poisonedapple



Series: Bardic Inspiration [7]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Bedside Vigils, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 05:51:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13288329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonedapple/pseuds/poisonedapple
Summary: a record of the final thoughts of vox machina, as many as they have





	live as many times as you got to, but you only gotta die once

**Author's Note:**

> me titling fic: i mean it sounds cool (?) who cares if it makes no sense right????????
> 
> warning for spoilers right up to the last episode.

i.

 

'it isn't right,' grog thinks, when the herd corrals around a single elderly gnome that they are ready to kill.  grog says, "stop."  his family beats him, leaves him for dead.  his father spits on him.

 

'it isn't right,' grog thinks.  those are his final thoughts.

 

ii.

 

pike doesn't feel pain when jurazel picks her up by her middle.  she doesn't even really realize it when glabrezu's pinchers clamp shut and cut her in half.  all she sees is grog's face, gray skin going pale as he loses his rage with his axe raised above his head and for the first time in her life she sees terror in her brother's face, and grief.  her last thought is that she needs to get stronger, so that grog never makes that face ever again.

 

iii.

 

grog doesn't think much of anything when k'varn pulls his soul out of his body and absorbs it into his horn.  he never thinks when he's raging.  he'd gone into this battle thinking he'd kick some beholder ass, that's all.

 

iv.

 

'how dare this dragon raze upon my land,' tiberius thinks 'my family, my friends, my people.  my land.  none of this belongs to any dragon and i will not allow some dragon to destroy it all.'

 

v.

 

vax is at the bottom of a hole at the moment so it's up to vex to make sure that the vestige is safe to take.  she peers at the deathwalker's ward but before she can check that's is safe for her to nab, percy has the armor in hand and a feeling of death washes over the pair and trinket behind her.  and she thinks that she is glad that it was her and not her brother here in this moment.

 

vi.

 

the sword hungers but grog has nothing to feed it with cause it doesn't want boar meat.  the enormous strength that grog had just possessed is sapping and then grog feels weaker than he did in his youth.  usually when grog feels bad he goes to pike, but blood still stain's pike's armor where craven edge had pierced her through.  grog tries to edge away, but his strength is leaving him and he is falling to his knees.  grog thinks there is nothing scarier than feeling his strength drain away.

 

vii.

 

ripley is what percy would have been, if he hadn't met vox machina.  that's why he forgives her for her part in the death of his family, and why he would forgive her even if she killed the family with him now. 

 

but he thinks he wouldn't forgive himself those deaths and that's why he can't let her leave.

 

viii.

 

as raishan's poison spills over her, vex can hear her deep voice cackle and say, "you've got some surprises, but you're not the only ones," and vex thinks, 'oh no, she has more surprises,' and then she's falling and she's out before she hits the ground.

 

ix.

 

scanlan never actually thought death would come for him, partly in ego and partly in pessimism.  as ice and cold rushes over him he thinks, 'wow this room full of lava room sure is chilly right now.'

 

x.

 

'please,' scanlan thinks - his words stop raishan short from one attack but he can't block the next as it comes at him. 'i can't do this again.' 

 

and he does not mean dying, he means coming back.

 

xi.

 

vex is not there to see this moment and for that percy is glad - he does not want her to see this, raishan's teeth snapping close to disembowel him.  he does not want to think of what her face would look like in this moment and he thinks of her sly smile last night in the bath.

 

xii.

 

'what luck,' vax thinks, that it should be him that dies today and for once he need not grieve a member of his family for even a moment. 'what good luck indeed.'

 

xiii.

 

'you only live once,' keyleth thinks and goes goldfish.

 

xiv. 

 

'what a fucking piece of work,' vex thinks as vecna turns to her.

 

"sleep," he tells her.

 

'fucking ugly too,' she thinks.

 

xv.

 

vax sees himself turned to dust moments before it happens - but he also sees pike taking his sister's face in her hands and bring her back to life.  'what a blessing keyleth has given me, to know that vex shall live.'

 

xvi.

 

there'd been time where vax had thought he was about to die and didn't.  actually there'd been several of those, but at that thime he'd thought briefly about keyleth, but mostly of vex.  this time he puts his sister out of his mind makes himself think only of keyleth, beautiful keyleth, as black spots being to blot out artagan's face as the arch-fey's hands continue to tighten around his throat.  'kink shame, actually' vax thinks in surprise.

 

xvii.

it has been one of the hardest winters that vax had ever lived through, but sweet spring was coming.  'this is not the end, death is not the end,' vax thinks, walking away and leaving snowdrops in his wake. he does not look back upon vox machina.  this will not be the last time he has with them.  'this is only the beginning of the happiest moments of your lives - be happy. i am.'

 

* * *

 

 

 xviii.

 

'now that's the way to go,' grog thinks with a grin, blood in his teeth and beard and on his knuckles. 

 

xix.

 

everything that percy does not want in the wrong hands is already destroyed, and so percy's last thoughts are with the people and things he is proud to leaving behind.  his legacy.  his family which is so much bigger than what he'd lost the first time.  his clock tower that will tick even when his heart stops beating.

 

xx.

 

larry holds his right hand against his lips, kissing the back of it, while vex has his left in hers.  they smile and cry and say they love him.  'what fun, this life has been,' tary thinks, and he is on to his next great adventure.

 

xxi.

 

vex has survived so many of her family and she lived her life to the fullest for the ones she lost and did not let herself grow bitter for the ones that she did not.  but this time, finally, is her time.  'i shall embrace death as my best friend,' vex thinks.

 

'unless what greets me is that bitch raven queen and then i'll fucking deck death in the face.'

 

xxii.

 

trinket holds on until vex goes and not a moment more - much as he couldn't bare to live without her, he could not bare to leave her alone.

 

'my vex'ahlia, i shall be with you always.'

 

xxiii.

 

scanlan has snot dripping from his nose but he is smiling and clutching her hand and keyleth her other.  pike feels the warmth of the everlight there with her, ready to guide her to the last.

 

pike strokes her friends' hands with her thumb and thinks that her love that burns for them is the strongest force she has ever known.

 

 xxiv.

 

what a long life he has led, and while not all of it had been easy - scanlan thinks it was all worth the while.

 

* * *

 

 

0.

 

after a thousand years of life, keyleth's face is finely lined and wizened, the voice of the tempest places the mantle of the tempest upon the newest headmaster's shoulders. the role of voice of the tempest has changed much in the millennia by keyleth's own will but the mantle remains.

 

after the new voice's ceremony, but not right after, keyleth holds a private one of her own - one she has much prepared for.

 

she becomes her raven sun tree and by doing so she becomes part of the essence of nature and magic herself.  she becomes divine and her roots stretch reaching across all the lands, never-ending.  her half-elven form ends, but she never does.

 

keyleth has only one final thought her entire life - you only live once.  and she was wrong.  but she only ever died the once.

**Author's Note:**

> :-)
> 
> i took some liberties with things and idk if marisha meant sunsetting into the tree as in being buried there or becoming the tree but boy do i like the idea of her being part of the a sun tree and living basically forever and all the bb druids making her the first tree they cast speak with plants with even 5,000 years in the future it is keyleth's dork ass voice answering their questions.


End file.
